Former state Rep. Buddy Carter got 85.61 percent of the Liberty County vote for the District 1 state Senate seat in Tuesday's special election. In sharp contrast, Carter's opponent, Dr. Billy Hair, received 13.92 percent of the county's vote.

The Board of Regents of the University System of Georgia Monday named Dr. Brooks A. Keel, 53, vice chancellor for research and economic development and professor of biological sciences at Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge, president of Georgia Southern University in Statesboro.

BRUNSWICK - A jury deliberated for about two hours Monday before finding a Georgia man guilty of murder and child molestation in the death of a 6-year-old boy whose body was later discovered wrapped in trash bags and dumped near a road.

The jury in coastal Brunswick convicted David Edenfield, 61, in the March 2007 sexual assault and choking death of young Christopher Michael Barrios.

ATLANTA - Mercer University President William D. Underwood named state Rep. Ron Stephens, R-Savannah, to the Board of Governors for the Mercer School of Medicine in Savannah. As a member of the board, Stephens will provide counsel to the president of the university on the direction of Mercer's Savannah Medical School. He will help recruit students, assist in planning campaigns and offer advice on the operation and governance of the school.

BRUNSWICK - A Georgia man on trial for molesting and slaying a 6-year-old boy says "I should be punished" after looking at photos of the boy's dead body in a videotaped police interview shown in court Thursday.

David Edenfield, 61, faces the death penalty if convicted of the March 2007 slaying of Christopher Michael Barrios, whose body was found in a trash bag dumped near a road.

ATLANTA - Georgia's top court has rejected an appeal seeking to block a $2 billion plan to build the state's first new coal-fired plant in more than two decades.

The Georgia Supreme Court's decision is a setback for a coalition of environmental groups seeking to derail the Longleaf Energy Plant in southwest Georgia. The coalition also has support from the Rev. Joseph Lowery and other civil rights groups.

BRUNSWICK - Jurors in a Georgia courtroom Wednesday heard a horrific videotaped confession from a man who admitted he and his adult son stripped, sexually assaulted and strangled a 6-year-old boy inside a mobile home as the child pleaded with them to stop.

"He said 'I'm going to tell my daddy and my grandma,' and George choked him," 61-year-old David Edenfield said in the videotape, referring to his son, 34-year-old George Edenfield. David Edenfield later admitted helping strangle the boy.

SAVANNAH - Imperial Sugar Co. and managers of its Georgia refinery ignored known dangers of explosive dust for decades before a chain of dust-fueled fireballs erupted at the plant last year and killed 14 people, investigators said in a report Thursday.

The U.S. Chemical Safety Board, which investigates industrial accidents, said it found written warnings of explosive dust hazards in refinery memos from the 1960s and that the deaths likely could have been prevented by routine housekeeping.